Page 77 of Nita's Redemption

She pulled him away from the doorway, trying to get closer to her other mates. ‘Link, Tank, something is wrong. Can you sense it?’

‘What do you mean?’ Link was the first to respond while Tank began coming toward them still holding his pool stick.

‘What’s up with Abe?’ Tank asked.

She explained what was going on. Fear for Abe and the other pack members had her sending out her senses. ‘We need to get out of here. I don’t think we’re safe even with the wards Zeus has set.’

‘Abe, what do you feel?’ Link asked his brother.

‘My skull feels like someone is trying to crush it with a crown of thorns.’ He held his fingers around the entire span of the top of his head, squeezing as if that felt better. Only Nita feared it was he who was harming himself.

“Abe, stop it. You’re the one trying to harm your own head. Please, hold me,” she begged.

Her words, or maybe it was the desperation in her tone that brought him out of whatever had ensnared him. “Fuck, there’s trickery in the air. At first, I heard a steady pounding, but it wasn’t coming from the jukebox. I looked up to see if Nita was okay, and I recognized a female ready to run, so I made my way to her, but then I sort of got lost in my head.” Abe reached for Nita.

She wrapped her arms around him, resting her head on his chest. His heart was thumping loud and fast. “I was contemplating stepping outside because the air in here smelled putrid,” she admitted.

“Shit, we need to get everyone out of here.” Tank turned slightly, catching the bartender’s eye. The male was a shifter from their pack as well. He nodded and then the music stopped. The silence was nearly as deafening as the music was loud.

“Shadow Packs, we are going to have to cut our evening short. I don’t want to alarm any of you, but there is something nefarious going on inside and outside of this pub. Without everyone shouting at once, I’m going to ask a question. Instead of everyone shouting an answer you are to raise your hand. I’ll call your name and ask you what it is you have to say. We are not going to spend more than five minutes doing this. If your name isn’t called here, we will reconvene at the packhouse to discuss. Now, has anyone felt off?” Tank asked.

Nita and her males stood next to Tank, paying close attention to the hands that went up. She tapped into the abilities the demoness females had given her. Her males were aware she wasn’t as human as she’d been since she’d taken the females’ blood to survive on Olympus. Thanks to that exchange, she had a deeper well to draw on. Like Bakra and the others, she could flow out of her body and into another’s conscience without them being the wiser. Not that she’d done it since returning to Earth. In her friendly demons words, it’s rude to go traipsing in other beings minds, unless they’re porchdick jackholes, then go on and stomp around their motherfucking heads.

She went from one raised hand to the next, stopping on one of the males she had met from Hurricane’s pack. Nita sent Tank his image, happy he didn’t question her.

“Hayze, what is it, brother?” For Tank to refer to the other males in such a friendly way meant he was accepting them. That would go a long way toward the rest of the pack doing the same.

“About ten minutes ago, I started to feel suffocated, but before that I swear I thought someone had shit their pants. Truly I looked around me trying to find who had crop dusted me, but nobody was even remotely near me. It smelled like rotten eggs and swamp ass rolled into one big ole shadooby. Trust me, I know what swamp ass smells like, and it ain’t good after a night out drinking with my friends.” Hayze put his hand on his stomach while making a gagging sound.

“Hayze, you throw up, and I will so kick your fucking ass. You know that Legend and Ledger are compassionate yackers.” Hurricane pointed his finger at Hayze then at the other two males with accusing eyes.

Sure as shit, the two others had their hands over their mouths while their cheeks were puffed out as if they were fighting the urge to throw up. Fuck, she so did not want to witness three big males throwing up. Hell, with them being shifters, they very well could’ve been out hunting for game before they’d come to the pub, and who the fuck knows what they’d eaten. Upchucked rabbit or deer would not look good on the return flight from their tummies. Oh gawd, she felt her own stomach do a little turn.

“Yoohoo, your favorite demon is here. Oh yikes, why does most of you look green? Not green in the crocodicks male kind of green, but green like y’all gonna toss your dinner right in the middle of this establishment. FYI, Bakra does not clean up that shit. I have before, like in years past. Okay, I admit, I cleaned little Miss Nita’s upchuck recently, but in her defense and mine, she didn’t like squid. Not everyone does. It’s an acquired taste.” Bakra stopped talking for a moment as she walked around the room, placing her pointer finger on several foreheads. “Feel better now?”

“What did you do?” Tank asked.

Nita had traced Bakra’s actions with her eyes, hiding a smile behind her hand. She knew Bakra’s outlandish words was a distraction while the female took her time moving from pack member to pack member, easing their illness. Of course, Nita had thrown up, but the squid in question wasn’t from Earth, and even if it had been, she was not a fan of seafood. In her mind the food from the sea was for sea creatures, not those who couldn’t survive under water like humans and shifters. She shuddered when she pictured the slimy thing Bakra had plopped in the center of their table. It had beady little eyes, like a hundred of them. It might have been dead, but she swore it was staring at her, blaming her for its untimely death.

“It wasn’t staring at you, NitaB. The eyes are the best part of the squid.” Bakra sighed like she was chiding a child.

Nita poked her pointer and middle fingers toward her eyes then shoved them toward the demoness. “Bullshit. They were glaring at me. I saw them with my own eyes. I couldn’t sleep for days because they invaded my sleep, whispering things like please don’t eat me.” Another shudder wracked her body.

Bakra laughed so hard she was bent in half. Finally she stood straight, tears running down her beautiful face. There wasn’t a single demon female in their group that wasn’t simply stunning, but Bakra was the most gorgeous. She was totally unaware of her beauty though. “Oh, my sweet Nita. That was Menka, I think. I thought she’d confessed she’d been the one to do that?”

She squinted, picturing Menka with Nita’s hands wrapped around her throat. That female was in for a beating the next time they saw one another. “I am going to kick her ass,” Nita growled.

Bakra nodded. “I will keep score. We need to get some sexy ring boys. You know shirtless hunks to carry cards between rounds.”

ABE TUGGED AT HIS EAR, working to keep his lips sealed. If or rather when this fight happened, he knew Bakra would find males she found appealing to walk around the ring in little to nothing just as boxing on Earth did. The difference being there wouldn’t be scantily clad females doing the card holding.

“So, tell me, where is the stank coming from, and good goddess, can I eliminate it or the stinky owner? I will totally be doing the world a service if I off the person who is clearly decomposing as we stand here.” Bakra did a slow walk around the room, sniffing each corner and person she encountered.

“We don’t know where it’s coming from, Bakra. Tank and the rest of us think it’s best if we head back to our lands where we know it’s protected. Brock agreed to allow us to come here because there were wards that Zeus had placed around the pub. There must be a weakness or another way for an enemy to breach the protection he’d placed on it.” Abe pulled Nita around to stand in front of him. For some reason, he wanted her where he could see her and have her back protected.

“I can flash at least ten at a time. It’ll take me a few trips, but it’s doable. The females I could take more at once since they’re smaller.” Bakra completed her circuit of the pub.

“I think that’s a good idea.” Tank agreed.

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